Once Upon a Time: Destiny Dreamer
by Doverstar
Summary: Regina casts a spell upon the newborn baby of Snow White's most loyal villagers! She dreams of the future, a curse she can't break. Rumplestiltskin aids her family and she goes to London, she grows up forgetting her parents, longing for a family. When a Shadow comes to her window, she, hoping for answers, is taken to Neverland, and meets a boy who will change her life forever...
1. Prologue

**(Author's Note: Bear in mind these are spoilers for OUAT's Season 3! All the way up to the episode _Ariel_. It will add information into the plot as the series goes on and I write the next few chapters. Enjoy! I know OCs are generally shameless self-inserts and all we really want is canon characters, but do try and give Elle a chance, won't you? I worked hard to make her mildly acceptable! ~Doverstar)**

* * *

_In The Fairytale Land That Was..._

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful kingdom, surrounded by a vast, enchanted forest. The citizens were kind and simple, and there was a time when the village was a happy place to visit.

But by and by they came to be under the reign of a conceited and wicked Queen. She had overthrown and banished Snow White, the kingdom's rightful ruler, and had had the King murdered. She consorted with the famed Dark One, Rumplestiltskin, and used her black magic to terrorize the villagers for years and years.

It didn't take long for the peasants to begin to lose hope. Would they ever be safe from the evil Queen Regina? Would Snow White return to rescue her people? Or were they doomed to be pawns of the ill-tempered mistress and her dark heart forever?

Luckily, as an outlaw, Snow White found true love with Prince Charming (or James), who inspired her to avenge her father and take back her kingdom. Together with the seven loyal dwarves, they set out to stop Regina and gain the trust of the commoners.

When Regina received word that her enemy had recently been trying to rally a group of villagers against her, she decided to personally send Snow White a warning. It was this: that she, Charming, and the dwarves leave and never return, or watch as Regina tore the kingdom apart with her dreadful powers.

Shaken, Snow White and her companions regrouped at the river, while Regina hatched a plot of her own.

She was confident, of course, that Snow would take her dear Prince and sickening little people and vanish out of fear. Well, almost confident. She needed to know for certain that her nemesis couldn't retaliate. That she would be victorious in the end. She needed to be one step ahead of them at all costs. It was the only way to triumph.

How to do it? She had many abilities, giving into the dark magic in her soul, but the constant knowledge of what was to come wasn't one of them. She had to find a Seer, perhaps, someone who could tell the future. A prophet?

Her first thought, obviously, was the Dark One. Rumplestiltskin, curse him, had recently gained the power to see into the days ahead. But unfortunately she owed the vile Beast one too many favors already. She wasn't about to let him control one more piece of her plans.

And besides, they'd been having a bit of a spat recently. He wouldn't have helped anyway.

The evil Queen rode down the forest path to the nearest town, mind whirling.

Regina needed a tool of her own, something all hers. Perhaps a difficult and powerful enchantment? She could do it, she was sure-with the right amount of black thoughts as she cast the spell. And with the cleanest of specimens...someone who had not yet done anything to darken their heart. Yes. A pure heart may be just enough to...

The sound of a baby wailing reached her ears.

Perfect.

Regina lifted a very manicured hand, ordering her guards to stop the carriage.

* * *

"She's beautiful!" cried Farthing. The humble blacksmith had become a proud father only hours earlier.

His wife, Guinevere, beamed down at their newborn daughter.

"Isn't she?" she gasped, eyes wet. "A lovely baby girl. Such blue eyes! Like yours." She kissed him.

"Yes," breathed Farthing. "What shall we name her?"

There was a pause as both parents set to thinking. Guinevere gazed at her daughter and the baby caught Farthing's thumb in her little pink palm.

"Elizabeth," murmured the blacksmith's wife. "Let's call her Elizabeth."

"Elizabeth." Farthing nodded. "She won't grow up in the dark times we've seen," he vowed. "Snow White will reclaim her throne. Regina will be no more."

"Good always triumphs over evil," agreed Guinevere. She tickled the baby's tummy, her red curls falling over Elizabeth's sackcloth blanket. "Did you hear that, little one? Good will win."

"Oh, I don't know about that."

The door to the cottage burst open. Armed guards stormed in, and Queen Regina herself stood among them. She walked with her head held high, black gown trailing the dusty floorboards. A small, cruel smile played about her red lips, and her eyes were cold when she surveyed the formerly-happy scene before her.

"Regina!" Farthing drew a long dagger from his belt, blonde hair messy with soot from work, so that he looked somewhat wild and unpredictable.

"Stay back," he warned.

"My, my." Regina smirked. "Is that any way to greet your beloved queen? After all, I traveled all the way down from the castle just to pay you a visit. You didn't even say hello! Congratulations. A girl?"

Guinevere narrowed her eyes, speaking through her teeth and trying not to tremble. "What do you want from us?"

"Well." Regina spread her hands. "You act like you've got something worth keeping, dear! But not to worry. I've come with a gift that will change that." She took a few steps closer to the bed in the corner, taking her sweet time. "It'll be of more use to me than to you, I'm afraid. Still," she added, leaning forward with a sneer, "who doesn't like birthday presents?"

Guinevere pulled the baby close and glared at Regina. Her husband stepped in between the two women and pointed his knife at the Queen.

"You aren't welcome here," he spat.

Regina raised her eyebrows. "Well, aren't we bold?" she tutted. "For a peasant. Haven't you realized yet how worthless you all are?"

Farthing took a step forward, perhaps to give her a warning slash, but he never got that far. She snapped her fingers, lifting the burly man into the air, a gust of wind slamming him against the table and chairs behind them.

Guinevere gasped, helpless and sore after childbirth. All she could do was watch and curl her arms around her baby, fear plain in her green eyes.

The guards heaved her husband up and pinned him against the walls. Farthing struggled, but one of the guards slammed the butt of his spear into the blacksmith's stomach to still him. It worked. Farthing doubled over in pain.

"Cute. Now..." Regina turned back to Gwen. "Where were we? Oh yes, the gift. That's right. You should be proud. I've chosen your daughter to play a very special role in my plans."

"You..." Guinevere, shaking-from exhaustion or terror, she didn't know-gasped out, "...you will lose. Snow White will defeat you. And if you think we can't fight for our daughter..." She took a deep breath. "Think again. Elizabeth won't be your pawn. You will not have her."

Regina's eyebrows shot up, amused. She straightened. "Oh, not yet, no. Not until she's old enough. It needs time to settle in, you know."

"What does?" Guinevere was afraid of the answer, but she couldn't take it anymore. She had to know what this witch wanted with her child.

"Weren't you listening? My gift, of course." Regina pulled a satchel from the folds of her dress.

The satchel was black, like the rest of her outfit, save a light blue picture stitched into the outside: a picture of an opened eye. The pupil was dark purple, and there was a small silver jewel at its center, glinting maliciously at Guinevere.

Regina opened it and plucked out a small necklace made of cold silver. Hanging from it was a little wooden circle. A single blood-red feather, no longer than your thumb, dangled from the bottom of the charm. Guinevere recognized it. She had one hanging over the doorway of the cottage. It was a miniature dream catcher. This one was different, though. Weren't dream catchers supposed to have little strings of twine etched back and forth in the center, to supposedly catch bad dreams? Yet this was just a wooden ring. Nothing in the middle at all. What did it mean?

Regina lifted a hand, the one that wasn't gingerly holding the silver necklace, and two of the guards came forward and laid hands on baby Elizabeth.

Farthing staggered to his feet, still clutching his stomach, but the spears of the guards held him back. Guinevere screamed and tried to keep them from taking the child, but she was weak and didn't want to risk hurting Elizabeth by struggling.

Heart pounding, she felt her fingers slip and her newborn was in the awkward, metal-clad hands of a young guard, who looked to be in his very early 20's.

Regina stared down at Elizabeth. Her eyes glittered contempt. Soon she would have all she needed to ensure that her enemies would get what they deserved. It seemed so simple now; why hadn't she done this before? Her pride had something to do with it, obviously. She had the world at her disposal. The ability to predict the future was unnecessary. Child's play, when it came to magic. If you were truly in control you would have no use for it. But ever since Snow White, her control over everything-anything-was no longer secure.

Fastening the silver necklace around Elizabeth's neck, Regina began to chant.

The necklace glowed a blinding white, and to Guinevere's despair, Elizabeth's beautiful blue eyes turned glittery gold in a matter of seconds.

The baby was perfectly fine. She didn't cry when the guards took her, but when the necklace was hung about her, she began to squirm uncomfortably. Farthing wondered in anguish whether or not Regina's spell was somehow hurting his daughter.

Regina opened her eyes. She smiled down at the child, but it was a wicked smile, one without happiness.

Elizabeth's flailing little hand caught hold of the necklace. She tugged at it, having discovered that this was the source of her discomfort, and made a gurgling sound as if being choked. Her mother gave a sob in the corner, holding out her hands for the guard to give the baby back before she hurt herself. The guard did no such thing, attentive only to the Queen's signals.

Elizabeth actually managed to break the necklace off; its chain was so delicate. She uncurled her tiny fingers and the necklace smashed to the floor.

Farthing glanced at his wife hopefully, beginning to look relieved. Perhaps now the spell would be broken.

But their daughter's eyes remained golden in color.

There was another flash of light from the necklace, and suddenly it was whole again, back around the infant's neck.

Regina's smile widened. "See that?" She snarled to the peasants. "It can't be undone. The necklace will always reappear, always be there. Wherever you've buried it, however many times you try to destroy it, it will return. Reminds me of someone." Her smile melted. "Snow White will lose. She will regret the day she betrayed me. She will regret coming back. And I will have my happy ending. Your precious daughter-" Regina's gaze switched to the baby again. "-will make certain of it for me."

"What have you done?" shouted Farthing, pushing against the guards, but to no avail. "What did you do to her?"

"I thought you'd never ask!" Regina spread her hands. She paced the room once or twice as she spoke, relishing the sound of her own voice. "In three years' time, the spell will begin to take effect. That innocent little creature will be plagued with dreams of the future, for all eternity! She won't know what they mean, and she won't be able to stop them. And when three years have passed, I shall return for your darling Elizabeth. She will be mine to use as I wish. And if either of you give the slightest resistance-if you even try to run-I will burn this house to the ground with you inside, take the child, and have my guards slaughter everyone within fifty miles of this place. Is that understood?"

Farthing's face revealed the murderous thoughts running through his mind. Gentle Guinevere was struck mute with horror.

Regina turned. "Give little Elizabeth back to her mother," she ordered the young guard.

Elizabeth was handed over to Gwen, whose tears flowed freely as she pulled the child to her chest.

"Release him," added Regina, flicking a hand toward Farthing as if bored. "Hold her while you can, dear," she sneered over her shoulder to them. "Three years can go by so quickly..."

Farthing stumbled toward his family, shielding them with his arms even as Regina reached the open door.

"...Especially if it's all you have left."

With that, the evil Queen disappeared, leaving behind a terrified mother, a broken father, and a golden-eyed, wailing baby girl.

* * *

Three Years Later...

"Must you always leave so early? I haven't even finished breakfast!"

"The early bird catches the worm, Gwen!"

"Why on earth would you want to catch a worm?" laughed Guinevere, stirring a pot with a wooden spoon.

"I caught you, didn't I?"

She lifted the spoon and hit her husband on the top of his sandy head.

"Oi!" Farthing gave her a kiss on the cheek. "I'll see you tonight."

"Hurry home."

He turned, blacksmith hammer on his belt, ready to leave for work.

"Papa?" came a sleepy voice from the back room.

Farthing and Guinevere both directed their attention to their 3-year-old daughter.

Elizabeth was a drowsy bundle of blonde curls and a brown sackcloth frock in the middle of the cottage, rubbing her eyes and yawning repeatedly.

Farthing scooped her up immediately and twirled her around in the air. That woke her up; Elizabeth was giggling hard before he'd even finished.

"Happy Birthday, Elle!" he cried, giving her a big hug.

She squeezed him tight. "Do you have to leave today, Papa?"

"Aye, 'fraid so. But I'll be back tonight-" he glanced over both shoulders as if sharing a juicy secret, and leaned forward eagerly, whispering, "-with your present!"

She bounced a bit, clapping her hands. "I get a present?"

"Of course," Guinevere chided. "Three years old is a big number."

She and Farthing exchanged a glance , one Elle missed. A single glance, one pair of eyes filled with concern and the other filled with reassurance.

"Until tonight, then!" said Farthing brightly, breaking the silence.

He gave his wife a kiss, pulled Elizabeth into another hug, and was out the door in a matter of minutes.

"He didn't take the sword," Elle noticed. "How come?"

Guinevere shrugged. "Perhaps he didn't need it today."

"But he always takes it with him."

"Well-"

"Did he leave it for us?"

"Breakfast is ready!" Guinevere quickly scooped Elle's breakfast onto a dish and set it on the wooden table.

Elle climbed into a chair. "I had a bad dream last night, Mama."

Guinevere dropped her ladle. Hand trembling, she picked it up again. "Oh?"

Elle nodded.

"What about?"

The girl shrugged. "Can't 'member. Lots of things." She held up her fork. "I killed the eggs!"

Guinevere glanced down. Her daughter had chopped up her egg; the meal was in ribbons on the dish.

"Yes," she stammered, smiling and trying to appear calm. "Yes, I can see that. Eat properly, dear; you're making a mess."

Elle went on chewing happily. As her daughter ate, Guinevere retrieved the spoon and went to finish Elle's new dress she'd been sewing, the cotton one with the red bow. Worry made her hands twitch as she worked and Elle sat on the floor of her own room, on her belly, drawing with a charcoal pencil on a rough sheet of scroll.

Elle was three years old today. Regina hadn't shown up in any way since the child's birth. But she'd promised to be back. Today, probably. Farthing and Guinevere had both lost nights and nights of sleep, just talking about what they could do for their daughter, to keep her from being taken.

They had to make sure Elle would be all right. They had to make sure she was safe. That she wouldn't become a tool of the wicked Queen's.

Elizabeth's 'gift' hadn't really been evident until breakfast that morning. As far as they could tell, Elle slept soundly. She never had a single dream of any kind. As for the necklace-she didn't think much of it. She tried taking it off a few times when she'd been two, but after noticing that somehow it just returned to its former spot, she gave up and ignored it.

If Regina used Elle's abilities, she would have an advantage in her ongoing battle with Snow White. She might win.

Guinevere and Farthing couldn't allow that. They were possibly Snow White's most loyal followers among the townspeople, and to think that their precious daughter would aid in the victory of such murderous evil-it was dreadful. They loved their little Elle; they couldn't let Regina have her, but more than that-they couldn't do that to the kingdom. Using Elle, with whatever curse she had, Regina could easily endanger innocent people everywhere. It was selfish to hang back and refrain from action.

Elle suddenly appeared in the room. "Look, Mama! Look, look, look!"

Guinevere gasped and quickly shoved the finished dress behind her stool before her daughter could see it.

Elle handed her mother her drawing. "See?"

Gwen looked it up and down. "It's beautiful, dear! It's a lovely picture of...erm..."

"It's Snow White and Prince Charming!" Elle informed her patronizingly. "I made their heads really big though."

Ever since she'd been born, Guinevere would tell Elizabeth stories of Snow White and Charming, and promise at the end of each tale that good would always win. The two heroes had become something of a Fairytale to Elle, since she hadn't met them yet.

"Oh, of course! It's wonderful, Elle; very nice job."

Elle took the page back and looked up at her mother with those unsettling golden eyes.

"Can we go for a walk today?" she pleaded.

Guinevere felt a chill pass over her at the thought. "I'm afraid not, darling. Not today." Definitely not today. Especially not today. If Regina had spies about...

"But it's my birthday."

Guinevere sighed and smiled in a reluctant way. "I know."

"So you've got to do what I want today."

Guinevere tickled her with both hands, chuckling, "Is that so?"

Elle giggled hysterically. "No no, stop!"

Guinevere picked her girl up and placed her on her lap. "I think you're getting a bit greedy now, little miss," she teased, touching the tip of Elle's nose with a finger.

"If we can't walk, what will we do?" demanded the toddler, hugging her mother. "I'm bored."

"Well, when I'm done with my project we can have a game of hide and seek, if you wish."

"What project? Can I see?"

"No, no, no! It's a surprise!"

"For me?"

"Oh, certainly! It's your birthday, you know."

"Okay!" Elle scrambled off of her lap and picked up her charcoal pencil. "I'll draw some more and you do the surprise, and then we play!"

Guinevere laughed. "It's a deal."

Elle stopped in the doorway, blonde curls swinging. "What should I draw, Mama?"

"It's up to you."

Elle tapped her little chin for a moment, thinking. Then she brightened and disappeared into her bedroom.

* * *

Farthing was home late. Elle was looking sleepy, yawning as she sat in her self-proclaimed spot on the wooden floor in front of the door, waiting for her father to arrive.

Farthing usually breezed into the house and swung her up onto his shoulders, hugging his wife or humming a tune as he kissed her on the cheek. He always behaved as if life was a pleasant stroll. Gwen was the only one who knew how hard he worked, how tired he could get.

Today he did not do any of those things upon his arrival from the forge.

He came in holding his right hand with his left. It was badly swollen and very red.

"Farthing!" cried Guinevere in dismay. "What happened?"

Elle sprang to her feet. "Did you get bitted by a bee, Papa?"

Farthing's voice was tight with pain, but he grinned at them both as if nothing were wrong at all, and his voice was light. "Oh, no fuss, I'm fine, it's just a burn."

"Oh!" said Elle, and a kind of recognition dawned in her eyes.

"It looks terrible!" Gwen readied a cold, wet rag to wrap around his hand. "Whatever did you do to it?"

"The iron slipped. Tried to catch it and missed. I'm all right!" He kissed her on the cheek as he took the rag.

"His shirt got caught on fire too!" Elle exclaimed.

Farthing paused. "That it did, birthday lass-how'd you know?"

Elle went to her room and came back out with a piece of parchment in her hand.

Farthing took it and blinked in surprise. "That's my hand! All up in flames. Very good, Elle! But how...?"

"I dreamed it and then I drawed it," Elle explained bashfully, rocking back and forth on her heels.

Farthing's smile disappeared. He fumbled with the paper, exchanged a terrified look with Gwen.

"You...saw it in your dream?" Guinevere stammered.

Elle nodded happily. "Uh huh!"

Another look. Elle wondered absently if they thought she was lying.

Gwen cleared her throat. "Well! I suppose you shouldn't have to wait any longer for your presents, should you?"

Elle squealed and forgot her parents' concern in a heartbeat, as children often will.

Guinevere brought out the dress she'd made and had Elle try it on. Elle insisted she should wear it to bed, because something might happen to it if she wasn't in it, especially at night when crawly things came about. Her parents assured her the dress would be fine and urged her back into her sackcloth nightgown. Still, Elle held the dress against her for the next hour before bedtime, in love with the new garment. Her mother looked very pleased with herself, of course.

Farthing's gift was different. He knelt down by the fireplace and presented it to the girl.

"It's a charm bracelet," he explained. "See? Look at all the different charms."

Elle turned it around and around on her wrist. It was a ring of silver, thin and perfectly-fitting, with little bronze charms hanging from short chains.

"It's got my name on it!" Elle cried gleefully, tracing her finger over the E in Elizabeth.

Farthing nodded. "That's not all!"

Elle continued to examine her gift. It had a flower, a sword, and an apple...

"Flower for beauty," Farthing explained. "A sword for bravery. And a snowdrop for-"

"Snow White!" cried Elle in ecstasy.

Guinevere grinned. Farthing fingered the apple charm.

"Exactly," he agreed. "To remind you of what we tell you every night before you fall asleep. What's that?"

"Good always wins," recited Elle.

"That's right, Elizabeth. Good always wins. You'll see that someday."

Elle was sent to bed after enjoying a piece of sugarbread. Three candles were lit by her window that night, signifying her change in age.

As she snuggled up in her covers, charm bracelet still on her wrist, her mother told her the tale of how Snow White had met Prince Charming, Elle's favorite story.

The child had only one question for her mother when the story was through.

"Mama, did you ever hit Papa with a rock?"

Guinevere laughed. "I don't think so!"

"She hit me with a spoon earlier," offered Farthing, passing the doorway.

"It was wood; it didn't count," teased his wife.

"Snow White's gonna live happily ever after soon, right Mama?" checked Elizabeth, yawning.

"I believe it," Guinevere answered, tucking her in. "No one could possibly deserve it more."

"Are we going to have a happily ever after too?" demanded the drowsy girl.

Gwen watched her for a moment. Elle's hair fell onto her face, hiding one golden eye. Her nose was scrunched up the way it got when she was curious. Her freckles were barely noticeable in the candlelight. That wretched necklace glowed only slightly in the dark of the blankets.

"I hope so," whispered Gwen.

Elle glanced up and a look of alarm came over her face.

"Mama, you're crying!"

Guinevere wiped her eyes. "Nonsense! Now go to sleep, darling. We've got a big day tomorrow."

"Why?" Elle's eyes slid closed and she fought another yawn without much success. "What happens tomorrow?"

Gwen glanced at the doorway. "We're...we're going on a little trip."

Elle was already asleep when Guinevere blew out the candle.

Farthing was waiting for her out in the main room.

"We can't," Gwen hissed.

"He's the only one who can help!" Farthing sighed.

"He's despicable. She didn't come today-maybe she's forgotten?"

"You know we can't take that chance. Regina will return. We have to do everything we can to make sure Elle isn't available."

Gwen put a hand over her mouth in thought as her husband paced. "It's wrong. Anything to do with him is wrong. I can feel it."

"The Queen is worse!" Farthing gripped her shoulders. "I know it's hard. I'm worried too. But we have to give her her best chance. It's only just begun. We have to save her. If that means finding a cure with-"

"All right," interrupted Gwen. "I understand. It's just-we can't have one more day? What if he harms her?"

Farthing's blue eyes grew stormy. "Then he'll regret it."

* * *

The journey was hard. A whole day's travel when the family didn't have a carriage. When they finally reached the castle, Elizabeth was sound asleep in Farthing's arms, in her new dress, charms jingling from the bracelet on her wrist.

"Do we just...walk in?" wondered Gwen uncertainly as they stood at the door. "There aren't any guards!"

"He doesn't need any, they say." Farthing gritted his teeth. "Come on."

They entered the castle and walked down a long series of hallways, twists and turns. There was a collection of dreadful objects lying about. Stuffed monsters, phials of colored liquid, shattered glass all over the floor.

At last they came to a set of large double-doors. Farthing took a deep breath. Guinevere squeezed his hand and kept her eyes fixed on her sleeping child's face.

Then they pushed the doors open.

An incredibly lengthy table faced them, with a feast fit for seven kings and their families. At the end sat what looked to be a funny little man with scaly skin.

"I'm _eating_, dearie!" Rumplestiltskin said with a huff, hand gesturing wildly. "I can only take one dramatic entrance per customer, y'know. Three of you is a bit much! Can't a man finish his supper in peace?" A cheeky grin spread across his face, but his eyes had a wild light in them.

Farthing laid Elizabeth down on a nearby sofa and glared at the Dark One. "You are not a man."

"You're a monster," Gwen added, standing guard over their daughter.

"That's not exactly proper table manners," sneered Rumplestiltskin.

"But a powerful monster. And we need your help," Farthing grumbled.

"Yes, yes, yes, of course you do! Y'wouldn't be here otherwise! Very well. What is it you desire?"

"It's the Queen," burst out Gwen. "Regina. She-"

"Oh, I do believe I just lost my appetite!" Rumple cackled insanely, standing so suddenly that Farthing backed up a few steps. "No, go on, dearie. I can tell already, this is no ordinary request! My favorite kind."

Farthing scowled. "She cast a curse upon our daughter, Elizabeth." He gestured to the girl on the sofa. "It's attached to the necklace-"

"Which won't come off," put in Gwen.

"-and it forces her to have dreams."

"Dreams! You don't say! Whatever shall we do?" Rumple smirked. "Is that all?"

"The dreams show her the future," growled Gwen.

"And Regina plans to use your bonny little lass to get ahead, hmmmmmmmm?" Rumple twiddled his fingers. "Not bad!"

"It's very bad," snapped Guinevere. "Please, you must help us cure her! Reverse the spell!"

"Oop!" Rumple grunted. "Sorry! A spell of that sort is ancient as the old books! No amount of current magic can reverse it." He didn't sound very sorry.

Farthing's heart dropped. "There must be something we can do."

"Regina will surely win if Elizabeth becomes her eyes," Guinevere murmured, ducking her head in despair. "And our daughter will be miserable."

"Now now now," Rumplestiltskin looked at them without sympathy, but with amusement. "You can't break her curse," he repeated. "But you can send it away."

They glanced up.

"Where must we go?" Farthing demanded. "Name it, and we'll-"

"You misunderstand!" snickered the Dark One. "It's a one-way trip, dearie! One exit-one passenger." He held up a single finger on both hands, parallel to his head, still grinning.

Farthing tensed. "You're telling us we can't go with her."

"But we have to!" protested Guinevere. "She's all we have."

"It's your choice," Rumplestiltskin gave an exaggerated shrug. "The land she is sent to will not be a pleasant one, I'm certain, but she'll survive, if someone is willing to take her. But who'd want a pathetic lump like that? Ahh, decisions, decisions!"

Farthing was tempted to punch him, but from what the legends about the Dark One said, he knew it would do more harm to them than it would good. Still, it irked him that the scaly beast was having fun with this.

He and Guinevere had a whispered conference. She was already in tears.

"I won't do it," she mumbled. "I won't let her go."

"I know," Farthing agreed. "We should never have come here. But-"

"Don't!" she cut him off. "I know what you'll say. You'll say it's the right thing to do. I don't care. I can't do it, Farthing."

Farthing's eyes grew wet then too. "I don't want to, Gwen, but-"

"No."

"Listen to me, it's selfish! Leaving her here, Regina will find her and take her from us. If she goes to the other world at least the kingdom has a chance. Snow White will have a chance. Good will have a chance." He took her hand. "And who knows-there could be other ways into that land. We could find her again."

"We'll search every second," choked Gwen.

Farthing nodded urgently.

"Tick tock, tick tock, dearies!" Rumplestiltskin called. "Time's up! Have we made our choice?"

They turned to look at him and were furious to see the glee in his eyes.

"What's in it for you?" asked Gwen. "If we do this?"

"Oh, I want the Queen off the throne as much as you do," growled Rumple, voice becoming dangerously low. "Any little thing that gets her blood on my hands-I call that winning." He smiled a bright, crazy smile. "We're not on friendly terms, she and I!"

"How do we do it?" Farthing asked, fists clenched at his sides.

"It's quite simple!" Rumple went to his cabinet. "You just need the proper tools."

He pulled out a scroll and a bottle of purple liquid. Casually the Dark One sprinkled the bottle's contents onto the scroll.

The scroll expanded until it reached the cieling. It was huge!

Rumple stuck his hand right through it. The paper rippled as if made of water.

"Can't be sure," he said over his shoulder, "but I can sense magic there!" His face grew dark. "Which means you don't have to worry about my following her!"

This was little comfort to the villagers.

Gwen inhaled sharply and reached out to wake Elle and say goodbye.

"Hang on, dearie," Rumplestiltskin stopped her. "All magic comes with a price!"

"Haven't we paid enough?" Farthing snarled.

"Well! You're giving up your child for a rocky cause! I'd say you're getting what you deserve, wouldn't you?"

"What's the price?" huffed Guinevere, still blinking back tears.

Rumple have them a nasty look. "She won't remember you."

Farthing's hands shook. "What?"

"That isn't fair," argued Gwen. "It's not enough she has to be separated from us, alone in a strange land, but she has to forget as well?"

"Are ye willing to pay, or not?" Rumplestiltskin hissed. "The portal won't last forever!"

Farthing helped Gwen wake Elizabeth.

Elle opened her eyes groggily, blinking up at them with those lovely gold irises.

"I had a bad dream again. Are we there yet?" she mumbled.

"We're here," Farthing said, helping her up. His voice was thick.

"Come here, my precious girl." Guinevere held out her arms and knelt down.

Elle didn't understand, but she gladly gave her mother a nice, big hug. Gwen squeezed a little to tightly, held her a little too long, because Elle immediately asked, "Is something wrong, Mama?"

Farthing rubbed his wife's back for a moment before taking Elle in his strong arms and hugging her as well.

"You remember those stories, my Elle?" he murmured in her ear. "How Snow White and Charming went through a lot of hard things, but they always came through-bravely-because they knew love was strong enough to keep them together?"

Elle nodded.

"That's what you have to do now. You have to be brave. Always wear your bracelet. Always smile. Never look back. And don't be afraid! Remember-good will win."

"What's happening, Papa? Why are you sad? Where are we?"

Farthing felt the warm year roll down his cheek. The first of so many.

"You have to go on an adventure," he told her quietly.

"Okay. Can I still wear my dress, Mama?"

Gwen laughed through her tears. "Of course you can."

Farthing set her down.

"Let's go, then!" Elle bounced on her toes. "I'm ready. I can be brave."

"We..." Gwen bit back a sob and turned away.

Farthing crouched down and held Elizabeth's hand, rubbing it with his warm, calloused thumb. "We can't go with you, Elizabeth."

Elle instantly drained of all cheer. "Why?"

"Because it's your adventure."

"But I want you to come. I don't wanna be by myself."

"You won't be." Gwen kissed her on the nose. "Not forever."

"We'll join you soon." Farthing smiled at her, vision blurry. "But for now we've got to say goodbye."

Elle's eyes filled with big crocodile tears. "I don't want to go. I want to stay with you. I don't like adventures anymore."

"Oh, you don't mean that!" Farthing forced a chuckle.

"I like adventures with you."

"We'll meet again," Farthing promised. "Mama and I will find you. But you have to be strong."

Elle let them embrace her again, all three of them in a big group hug.

Then Farthing pointed to the giant scroll. "Go on. That's a kind of door."

Elle walked in a cautious sort of awe toward the paper. She put one toe tentatively in. "It tickles," she said, but she didn't laugh.

Then she glanced over her shoulder at her parents.

"We love you, Elizabeth!" Gwen called.

"We'll see you soon!" Farthing added, waving, just as if she were only going to pick berries with her mother for the afternoon.

"When? Twenty minutes?" Elle begged.

They shook their heads, both quietly crying.

"Ten minutes?"

Another shake.

"Eleventy?"

"You can do it, Elle," Gwen pressed.

"Just like Snow White!" her father said in a teasing tone.

"Snow White..." Elle repeated, feeling a spark of adrenaline.

_Good always wins._

"...Okay." Elle lifted a hand. "Love you too."

Then she slowly stepped through, and her vision went white.


	2. Chapter 1: Welcome to Neverland

_19th-Century London, England: 13 Years Later..._

The orphanage was a cheery place. The owner was rich and merry, the staff was sweet, the meals were top notch, and the orphans themselves seemed never to run out of hope, no matter the age.

So why did Elle feel this terrible emptiness?

Sixteen with long blonde curls, dressed in a simple-yet-elegant salmon-pink gown and a white ribbon in her hair, Elizabeth sat alone on her bed, face blank.

She had been through another adoption interview today. Like all the others, they had wanted to adopt her as soon as possible, but after reading her file, the couple had left in a hurry, saying only, "We'll think it over," and then they never did. Same as the rest.

Elle seemed to hold promise as a daughter to anyone. Bright, pretty in a very homely sort of way, well-spoken, creative, kind. She could marry a man of stature and raise a family. She could attend a nice university, perhaps become a woman of respect and quality. Her artistic abilities held potential for wealth beyond measure, should her work be purchased.

But one look at her file and all that just didn't matter.

Elle wasn't grumpy about it. She wasn't bitter. She thought perhaps she deserved to be rejected somehow. She could not remember anything at all about her true parents-so they may have been dreadful people, and she could be the spawn of wickedness, and it was only fair that she'd be treated this way. The idea appealed to her. It was romantic. Scorned because of her heritage. Why not? It was just like a novel!

Still, no normal child could say they didn't feel a sharp tingle in their cheeks, a pressing sting behind their eyes when they were told they had been turned down once more. Sitting there-with her knees drawn up on the cot and her arms wrapped about them-was simply what Elle liked to do when this feeling came.

It would hurt, and if she thought long enough about the future and all those possibilities, it would slowly fade and be replaced by curiosity.

If she did get adopted, what sort of life could it be? Dull? Exciting? Would she meet a handsome lad in her new neighborhood? Would she acquire any new siblings? Would she have her own bedroom? However would she decorate all that space? Red, of course-red sheets, red walls, red drapes. She adored the color red.

So this empty feeling would soon pass too.

She had grown up using the British accent everyone around her used, as she couldn't recall having any other voice. She had been bombarded with questions about the past she didn't remember having, ever since she was little.

And that was strange. She'd been three years old when she woke up in a cold sweat, heart pounding, in the orphanage sick bay. Three was old enough to have memories of some kind, wasn't it? How had she learned to speak? Why was she wearing such a nice dress, why the golden eyes, why were there such strange charms on that bracelet, and why, oh why didn't that wretched necklace come off and stay off?

The orphanage had cared for her, stating she'd been in a coma for about a week after they'd found her, covered in white glitter of some kind, purple stains on her dress. She had been unconscious on a bench in Kensington Gardens, mumbling the same sentence over and over again: Good will win.

"What're you thinkin' about, then?"

Elle jumped.

A teenage boy with very red hair and lots of freckles came in and sat beside her.

"Hullo, Charlie!" she greeted happily.

Charlie was Elizabeth's only friend. At least, he was the only one who didn't ask questions she got bored of answering. He never asked why she couldn't remember things. He never asked to try on her bracelet or give her strange looks because of her oddly-colored eyes. He just listened. Or if he did ask questions, they were at least ones she didn't mind answering.

"Another turn-down," she said, and shrugged.

"Saw your file, didn't they?"

Elle nodded. "'_Abandoned at three, found spouting incoherent nonsense. Possesses troublesome sleeping habits: i.e. sleepwalking, nightmares, shouts during slumber and other strange noises. Amnesiac, prone to fits, difficult to console during evening hours. Keeps to herself in an unhealthy manner any time after noon._'"

"Rubbish," snorted Charlie. "You pinched yours?"

"I snuck a peek at it once. It's rather hard to forget."

"It's all rubbish."

"No, it's not," Elle laughed. "I do have troublesome sleeping habits. Nobody in their right minds would take in a child who sleeps like I do."

"I would!" Charlie said immediately. "Tell you what let's do, Ellie. When I get adopted, I'm takin' you with. They'll let us. I can talk people's tongues right outta their mouths, me. I'm quick."

"I noticed that," Elle teased.

Charlie looked around suddenly as if sharing a secret. He changed the subject, whispering, "Draw anything new?"

Elle smiled. No one on Earth had ever been allowed to see her sketchbook before but Charlie. It was just a book of parchment, scribbled all over with drawings of her dreams, page after page after page. It was the twelfth sketchbook she'd bought since she was ten.

By the time she was six, Elle had noticed that the dreams she had came true soon after she had them. It could be the day after, or a week, or two months, or even four years, but they were never wrong. She couldn't tell anyone, of course, no matter how much it frightened her. They would send her to the insane asylum. Just last week, they'd taken a girl from her father for talking about rabbits in waistcoats. Someone out there was always watching for that sort of thing, and so she must keep mum.

But Charlie could be trusted enough to at least see the foreign sketches, without the explanations behind them.

She took the sketchbook out from underneath her pillow and showed to her fellow orphan, turning to the last page she'd drawn on.

"Blimey!" he cried.

"Shh!" Elle giggled.

He clapped a hand over his mouth and said it again, this time in an apologetic whisper. "Blimey. That's talent, that is. What is it?"

Elle rubbed the corner of the latest page with a thumb. "A box. A cage, I think. Made of very long sticks."

"Who's inside, then?"

"Um...I'm afraid I don't know. No one, I suppose."

"What d'you mean, don't know? You drew it, didn't you?"

"Yes, but I never saw-" Elle stopped herself just in time. She shrugged. "I never thought of it."

"Is it me?"

"Of course not! Why would I lock you up?"

"I did steal your muffin yesterday."

"Oi, that was you? Charlie, for shame!"

"I nicked you a blueberry one today, though!" Charlie pulled it from his coat pocket. "You missed breakfast."

"Woke up early for the interview." Elle took the muffin and bit into it.

"It's a bit smashed," said Charlie with a sheepish grin.

"It's better that way," Elle insisted. "You can taste the effort."

"Effort?"

"Of running from the cook up two flights of stairs."

"Oh, yeah, that. Might be some sweat on it too."

"Brilliant!"

Charlie laughed.

"Come on, you lot!" called a girl named Rose from the doorway. "We've got to go; we'll be late for school."

* * *

Elle was not, obviously, a fan of sitting with a slate in front of her, listening to a terribly-dull woman drone on and on about mathematics. She was tired. She'd had to wake up early for the interview, as aforementioned, and she hadn't gotten a good night's sleep in weeks.

All she could do to keep herself awake was draw, of course. She hadn't gotten a chance to map out her latest nightmare, and it always helped her to clear it up after drawing it.

So she sat with her slate, scratching out what she thought was a pretty good likeness of the creature she'd dreamt of.

Suddenly there came a tap on her shoulder.

Elizabeth, engrossed in her sketching, did not look up.

"Psst!" came a sharp whisper to her right.

Elle slowly turned to look.

Wendy Darling sat in the chair beside her as usual, but her eyes were wide, and there was no trace of that sweet smile she was always passing about.

"Sorry. I couldn't help noticing your drawing," she whispered across the isle. "It's really quite good."

Elle blinked awkwardly, not responding for a few seconds. Wendy never forgot to greet her when she came into the classroom, but other than that, they didn't speak much.

Wendy had been distant recently. From the rumors, she'd been through some kind of horrid ordeal, and had come away changed. That is, she could be seen quietly weeping at times, when she thought nobody was looking. All anyone could get out of her was that the crying had to to with her adopted brother, Baelfire, who had gone missing shortly after said ordeal.

"Oh! Um, er, yes, thank you," stuttered Elle, remembering her manners. She lowered her voice. "It's just a quick piece, really."

"It's..." Wendy sounded like she was trying to steady her tone. "That shape. I know it."

Elle's heart nearly skipped a beat. Wendy recognized the creature? Because she certainly didn't. Did she have answers? Wouldn't that be just a fine cup of tea! Real reasons for her dreams. Imagine that.

"What do you mean?" Elle whispered, leaning in.

A long wooden ruler came smacking down on her desk. "No talking during the lesson, Miss Darling! You and your friend may continue your conversation on your own time." The teacher, Mrs. Flotsam, then returned to her boring little speech.

"But it is our own time," grumbled Elle. "You're eating it."

Wendy heard her and stifled a rare giggle. Elle felt a wisp of a smile flitter across her own face, but she returned to her drawing without any further distractions.

* * *

It felt as though class would never end. When it did, and the teacher dismissed them, Wendy met Elle at the gate.

"The Shadow," she said quietly. "It's magic."

Elle's head reared. "Pardon?"

"Magic. It's real. The Shadow is made of it."

Elizabeth stared at her.

"I'm not lying!" Wendy stomped a foot. "I mean it. It's true."

Elle nodded. "No, no, I believe you-really I do." It made sense. Perhaps magic was what made her dreams become reality.

"You've seen it, haven't you?" Wendy demanded. "That's why you were drawing it."

"Not exactly," Elle mumbled, shuffling her feet. "I-I dreamed it. Last night."

Wendy folded her hands in front of her and raised her eyebrows. "Well, that's it, yes-Neverland is linked to children's dreams."

Elizabeth tensed. "Neverland?"

Wendy looked away. "It's where the Shadow takes you. If you wish to go. But it only takes boys-except me." She dropped her voice to a whisper and she glanced over both shoulders. "I've been there. Time is different on Neverland."

"How?"

"You don't ever grow old."

"What, never?" The thought pleased Elle. "Really?"

"Yes, yes. But it's-"

"Does this Shadow talk?" Elle gripped her sketchbook in front of her. "Can it...I mean-I've got questions that need answering, and if Neverland is...is connected with dreams..."

"It can talk," Wendy interrupted her rambling. "In a frightening, strange sort of way. But only for certain people, and never very often. Besides-"

"What must I do?" Elle demanded. "To see it?"

Wendy lowered her gaze. For a moment she didn't answer, lost in thought. When she spoke, her voice was worried. "You just stand at a window and shout that you believe. Then, if you're lucky, the Shadow will come."

"Elle!" called Charlie from down the walkway. He was with the other orphans, headed back to the orphanage. "Come along!"

Elle hurried to catch up with him. "Thank you!" she called to Wendy. "I won't forget this!"

"Wait!" cried Wendy. "It's not how you think! Elizabeth!"

But Elle hadn't heard her. She was too busy planning exactly what questions to ask the Shadow that night.

* * *

The air was cold when the sun finally went down. Snowflakes had begun to fall.

When she closed her eyes, Elle was instantly asleep, dreaming as usual. The other girls always said kindly that they envied how she could go right to sleep, and not be bothered by the whispers or giggles around her. It was all well and good to be able to drift off so easily, but the nightmares made her dread it. It was the fact that sleeping was inevitable that brought the dread. The fact that she couldn't stop the dreams no matter what.

What would she see tonight?

Colors danced behind her eyelids. Sand was beneath her feet. It was very dark. A yellow glow suddenly lit up the shadows, and a tiny ball of light zipped past her. It was headed for the ocean to her right.

In the water, far out, was a ship. There was a flash, and suddenly she had a bird's-eye-view of the vessel. Its flag was unmistakably flying the skull-and-crossbones.

A pirate ship!

The ball of light from before darted down into deck and shot into the cabin below.

Then the scene changed.

Two men stood on the shore of a jungle, pulling in a fearsome creature from the water-a giant squid!

Then she saw a dark cave. She heard voices, people yelling at each other. They all sounded angry, but every word echoed countless times.

Another flash. An actual face appeared, completely clear, details engraved in her mind immediately.

It was a boy. He had chocolate-brown hair neatly cut, and wore a strange coat with a striped scarf. He was smiling very impishly, with a hint of intelligence along the brow, amusement in his innocent dark eyes.

Suddenly the sound of a heartbeat drummed in her ears.

_Thu-dump, tha-dump..._

_Tha-dump, tha-dump..._

A name danced across her vision.

The heartbeat grew louder.

_Tha-dump..._

_Tha-dump..._

_**Henry**__._

_THA-DUMP..._

_THA-DUMP..._

Elle woke up with a start.

She looked around. Everyone was sleeping peacefully; all was still.

_Henry_.

She pulled her sketchbook out from under her pillow and snatched up her pencil. With shaking hands and blurry eyes, she drew his face exactly the way she'd seen it in the dream.

"This one..." she breathed to herself, staring down at the page, "...this one's important."

Who was he? Such odd clothes. Nothing like they had here. Was he coming? Was he an orphan too? Did she need to watch for him? Or was it that he would die soon, and her dream knew it and held sympathy for him?

She tucked her sketchbook under her arm. She was tired, and not just physically. Elizabeth was tired of not knowing.

She needed answers. She couldn't wait any longer.

Elle slipped out of the girls' bedroom and tiptoed into the hallway. P_lease don't let anyone else wake up. Please, please, please... _

_Go quietly._

_Quieter, Elle, you idiot!_

_Floor creaks there; avoiding..._

She stood in front of the hall's one window, biting her lip the way she did when she was nervous. Was Wendy talking nonsense? Did it matter? As long as she got somewhere with this creature, something to go on-Elle didn't care how insane it was.

With a deep, dramatic breath, she closed her eyes and shouted the two words that changed her life forever.

"I believe!"

At first, nothing happened. Elle stood twiddling her fingertips against her side, a habit she'd picked up from piano lessons. Perhaps Wendy was as mad as a box of frogs after all. Well, she was nice anyway, and after all, who could be crazier than she was? They could be off their heads together.

Then the drapes fluttered. The windows blew open, and Elle leapt backward, nightgown swishing.

The Shadow-a wraith-like figure much taller than she was, with glowing white eyes, flew in, limbs swaying.

"You are real!" Elle gasped. She pressed herself against the wall. Was that a bad thing? Maybe she didn't want it to be real.

The Shadow loomed over her, silent.

"Please-" she began. "I saw you in my dream..."

Still no response. Not physically, not verbally. Hadn't the Darling girl said it could speak?

"I...I was wondering-I didn't mean to, um, to bother you, but-do you know...why I...I have such...trouble? Why I get such dreadful dreams?"

How on earth did one use manners with a shadow? Should she curtsy?

The Shadow swooped around her, its head tilting to the side. Good sign?

"Or why I can't...can't seem to remember anything?" added Elle, looking at her feet. Oh, if only it would answer! Perhaps she needed to say a bit more? Was it waiting for further information? She hadn't any left to give!

Still the creature was quiet. Elle stood there for about seven more minutes, waiting for it to reply somehow. It never obliged.

"Can't you say-or, or do-something?" Elle huffed.

A sound reached her ears. It sounded like a dying gasp, but over and over. She realized the Shadow was laughing at her.

Suddenly it stopped, and the Shadow became very still. It stretched out its hand.

Elle pressed her back harder against the wall. "W-What..."

It took hold of her wrist. It literally felt like wind whirling in a circular motion around her hand.

That is until it took flight.

The Shadow slowly lifted her from the floor. Her sketchbook in her hand (she actually tried hitting the creature with it) Elle kicked and struggled, but it was no use. The Shadow wouldn't let go. She tried to scream for help, but she found herself out in the night air, surrounded by clouds.

The screams died on her lips. She had a most horrific fear of heights. Everything in her body turned numb and quiet with a choking feeling of terror.

The Shadow didn't seem to care. It lifted her up, up, up, as if enjoying her suffocating panic. She didn't even care when she heard its laugh again.

She couldn't look anywhere but down for the moment, eyes locked on the city of London below. There went the orphanage. And the only home she could remember.

And the ground. That was important.

There went the ground too.

The Shadow stopped laughing and seemed to grow stronger for some reason. Its grip on Elle tightened.

She braved a glance up and saw why.

They were shooting toward the biggest, brightest star she had ever seen. Actually, it was the biggest brightest anything she'd ever seen.

Elle thought it would maybe burn her up or blind the Shadow so that it would drop her (please no please no please no), but it did no such thing.

Instead, it gave a brilliant flash as she and the Shadow passed through.

All at once they were skimming over the sea. Oddly enough, Elle found her voice, and the first thing she did was scream. She had to make up for all the screaming she hadn't done earlier. Obviously.

Fog came quickly and quietly, clouding all vision.

Still, the Shadow seemed to know exactly where it was going.

It dumped her into the open air, and her screaming grew louder. This wasn't a nightmare, which was going to be a crying shame once she hit the ground. At least in a nightmare she could wake up when she landed.

But when she tumbled onto the beach, she wasn't a bit hurt. She sat up, heart hammering in her chest.

The Shadow whizzed past her and into some trees a few feet away. Elle's hands were shaking.

"Wait!" she called. "You there! Come back!"

The Shadow completely ignored her. She was alone in the moonlight.

Elle stood up. The sand was cold between her toes, not at all warmed by any kind of sun. The trees grew dark and frightening against the starry sky and harsh wind. The sea smelled good, though, so that was something. She'd never smelled the sea before. Salty-that was nice.

She glanced down and saw her sketchbook lying open on the ground beside her. Quickly she reached down to grab it, afraid it would be ruined on the damp shore.

But someone else's hand snaked out and scooped it up before she could.

Elle jumped back, swallowing a cry of alarm.

A very tall and hooded teenage boy stood in front of her. With him were three others, all with hoods around their heads as well, like young monks. The thought would have been funny if she hadn't been so badly spooked. Too bad. She liked laughing.

The boy with her sketchbook sneered at her, and it wasn't at all a proper way to be greeted, especially when the boy's face hadn't been all that appealing in the first place.

She saw tufts of fair hair poking out from his hood. His eyes were cold, but there was a flame of cruel amusement in them as he looked her up and down.

Elle actually managed a whole sentence. "Who are you?" Good for her!

His expression didn't change. "Well, well. Look what we got here, boys. Welcome to Neverland."

Neverland. Of course. Stupid, stupid Elle! That was where she'd been taken. Hadn't Wendy tried to warn her?

"Please," she began, shaking. "I-I don't want to be here. I didn't mean to come, I was just...I wanted to talk to...the Shadow. It just grabbed me."

They exchanged chuckles without mirth. She felt like throwing up.

"I want to go home," she insisted.

Who cared if you never aged here? Already she could see it wasn't exactly paradise.

Now she could hear children sobbing in the distance. What was going on?

One of the boys took out a dagger and began picking his teeth with the point of the blade.

Yeah. At home in the orphanage sounded incredible just now.

"Well," said the fair-haired boy, "we don't have much use for girls on this island. You'll get your wish."

Thank. Heavens.

But then, perhaps out of boredom, he started looking through her sketchbook. She stiffened. No one was allowed to touch that. It was private. She even wrote the word inside the cover, in her best calligraphy.

Couldn't he read? Oh. What if he couldn't? What if he was stranded here without a roof over his head or a clean education? She started feeling sympathetic at the thought, before realizing that even if that was the case, they all seemed quite fine with it.

The boy paused at one of the furthest pages.

He showed it to the others. Slowly each of their expressions began to change. They got a hungry look in their eyes. Elle winced when they all turned it on her.

"Looks like you're not," the leader said. "So sorry." If that was what sorry sounded like...

"Not what?" Elle was afraid of the answer.

In a matter of seconds the other three boys had flanked her, taking her by her arms.

"Not going home," the first boy said with a sneer.

Elle inhaled sharply. No. She couldn't stay here. She had to get back. Charlie would be upset. He wanted to get adopted with her. Wendy would know something had happened! But if she tried to tell anyone, she'd get taken to the insane asylum. Elle hoped she wouldn't talk after all. She wasn't really, you know, worth it. Please don't let Wendy say anything.

"Let go of me!" she demanded. "Let go!"

They dragged her into the jungle. As much as she struggled, it was no use. They were very fit young boys.

The one in the lead still had her sketchbook, but her pencil was tucked behind her ear.

That was all right, then. At least that way they couldn't add to it. The thought repulsed her. Her sketchbooks were very much like a little bedroom for her brain. If a lot of strange boys went into your room and began poking around, how would you feel?

Elle tried not to focus on the thorns everywhere, dripping with something black that reeked of death. She tried to pretend a large purple spider hadn't just sprang over her feet. She even tried to imagine that the crying in the distance was just the wind.

It sounded nothing like wind. Don't be ridiculous.

Finally the group turned a sharp corner. A bonfire was blazing in a clearing, next to a strange, knotted tree much larger than the rest, a few odd wooden structures.

A fire? What, were they going to cook her? If they were cannibals, why hadn't they eaten each other yet? What if they meant to toss her sketchbook in? Charming. How like a boy. She imagined they'd laugh if it happened.

Then they tossed her roughly to the ground. She pushed herself up on her palms.

"Don't get up on my account," came a very nasty chortle.

Elle lifted her head and sat backward. "Thanks very much," she mumbled, before coming quickly to the conclusion that the owner had been sarcastic.

No manners here after all then. Good, good. She wasn't in the mood to mind her Ps and Qs. She was badly shaken.

She glanced up and saw a new boy leaning against the big tree.

He had light hair a bit wilder than the others'. Yes, wild definitely suited him. His tunic was dark, dark green, and his trousers were nearly the same; a bit paler. He wore boots and his strong arms were crossed in a sort of careless way. He watched her-no, studied her-with eyes a much brighter green than his outfit. But the brightness was overflowing his gaze, as if someone had poured so much in that it had leaked into his mind and poisoned it. He was physically calm. The eyes were what gave the madness away.

"You know girls aren't welcome in Neverland, Felix," said the boy. "This had better be important."

"I think you'll have some fun with this," said Felix, the one Elle had previously pegged as the leader. He handed the green-eyed one her sketchbook.

"Don't burn it!" Elle blurted. "I haven't filled it yet."

She immediately felt stupid, especially from the way the wild boy was looking at her. He frightened her from the moment she laid eyes on him.

He took the sketchbook and leafed through the pages, scanning them all with those intense emerald irises. At some he gave a smug sort of smirk, some he skipped past, and others he stopped to examine as if just by giving them his attention they could leap from the page.

Finally he came to the picture of Henry. His fingers tightened around the page and he trained that unsettling gaze on her, like she was finally worth looking at for he moment.

He turned the book around to show her. "What's this, girl?"

Well! Elle didn't like his tone. She wasn't fond of being treated like a piece of lint. And as much as he frightened her, she did have a little pluck she had saved up for a while, and now she let a tiny bit out. Idiot.

"It's a sketchbook," she said patronizingly. "You draw in it."

He towered over her with an irritated stare, and she regretted her words, stifling a shudder.

"Not very well, obviously," he said, voice dangerously relaxed. "Was this the best you could do?" He grinned mockingly.

The lads around her laughed.

Elle looked at the dirt, feeling wretched. "I've never met that boy. I don't know who it is."

"But I do." His shared amusement with the others vanished. "If you've never met," he said, "how did you come to draw him so accurately?"

"I thought you said I hadn't done it well."

"Answer the question."

Elle glanced behind her at the rest of her captors. "I...erm..."

"Speak up!" The leader ordered, sounding as though he thoroughly enjoyed her discomfort. "I'm a busy boy."

Elle scowled. "I dreamed him up."

"Dreamed?"

"Yes." She licked her lips. Her mouth was dry with fear. She detested the way he was watching her. "H-His name is...is Henry, I think."

The boy lifted his chin. "Is it now? Dreams have power. You saw someone extremely important."

Elle bit her lip. "You can have it."

"Sorry?" His eyebrows shot up, but for some reason she couldn't really believe anything could confuse him. It was as if he were always partly playing pretend. Half of him was real, and the other half was locked in a fantasy where he was the prince.

"The...the book. You can keep it. I don't care. Just...please, let me go. Let me go back." She tried not to let tears come to her eyes, but the thought of staying on the island, with this horrific creature before her, always staying the same, here forever and ever...

His eyebrows came down again, but one was lower than the other.

Then he began to pace.

"Oh, but this isn't enough." He held up the sketchpad.

Elle raised her head. "What?" Her voice was quiet.

"Information is strength," he said, "and you haven't given me much to go on." He shrugged one shoulder very slightly, faking apologetic.

"But I don't know anything else."

"Sure you do." He grunted. "Come on then. Where did you get this dream?"

"I-I-I really can't say. I don't know. I've never known! Please..."

"Are they all dreams? All these...poorly-drawn pictures?" He smirked at her.

"Yeah. Yes, they are, but-"

"You dream often."

"E-Every night. I-"

"And they each mean something, don't they?"

"I suppose."

"You've got more than that."

She lowered her gaze. "They do-they...well...er, they always come true."

She expected more laughter. She'd never told anyone this, and being forced left a rare lump of loathing in her throat.

"Do they?" The boy took another gander at the book. He looked back at the girl. "So you've got a gift."

"It's not a gift," she mumbled truthfully, bitterly. "It's more like a...a curse."

He stopped pacing. "A curse." He turned fully to face her. "Interesting choice of words, wouldn't you say, lads?"

The boys were either too engrossed in the interrogation to respond, or they weren't getting it. Elle knew the feeling.

"You know, you can't see the future in Neverland," the leader said. "I can't say I'm not disappointed. Seeing what lies ahead could make our game twice as enticing."

Game? What was he talking about?

"Pity. I suppose it comes with being in a place where time doesn't move," he went on.

Elle was afraid to look at him, so she just stared at the ground, listening.

"But Neverland runs on magic," he said. "It'll adapt to yours. You've had it long before visiting us."

Elle swallowed. "Had what?"

"You said it yourself." He gave her an expression of contempt, as if it should have been obvious. "You're cursed."

Elle's blood ran cold. "How do you know that?" she demanded. What else did he know about her? Perhaps the Shadow wasn't the one with the answers she desired. Well, clearly.

The boy grunted. "I can feel it on you. It's like a kind of aura. You reek of enchantment."

Elle knew somewhere in the back of her mind that she must be gawking. She couldn't help it.

"You can...feel it?" she repeated. "How?"

The boy grinned. "S'pose you could say I'm special that way." His eyes widened.

Elle wished she hadn't asked. She felt ill. He wasn't all there. There was a wickedness in the way he held himself.

He crouched in front of her. "Henry is the Truest Believer," he hissed. "You've seen him."

Elle wanted to scrambled backward. It wasn't that his breath was foul or anything petty like that (actually, it smelled rather like the juice of mint leaves, which was not in the least bit a bad thing). It was those bright eyes. They shot her nerves down. He was mad. Bonkers. Evil. She had to get away from here.

But she felt a spear tip at her back and was forced to remain as she was.

The Truest Believer? Was that supposed to mean something? Why did this ragtag bunch of lads want him? Poor boy.

The leader reached into his tunic and pulled out a scroll. He unrolled it and showed it to her.

Elle couldn't help gasping, the desired reaction.

On the scroll was a charcoal drawing of Henry. It looked nearly identical to hers. At least, you could definitely tell it was the same picture.

"You see?" the boy growled. "Your dreams are prophetic."

Elle couldn't speak. Hearing it out loud was a lot scarier than thinking it silently.

"That means you're valuable." The boy pocketed his scroll and let his arms hang loosely over his knees. "A seer could be just the thing to make my game a little more...entertaining."

Elle's fingernails dug into the dirt for pure anxiety. "You've got my book. I told you all I know. I must get back home."

He tilted his head. "Home? Please. You're orphaned."

Elle was getting a little used to him being on top of things now. But she assumed he liked being questioned, as long as the one asking did it out of ignorance at his hand.

"Who told you that?" she muttered.

"It's in your eyes," he told her matter-of-factly. "A lovely gold, by the way."

That did not feel like a compliment.

"I can't stay here," she began, mind going numb. This couldn't be happening. It was worse than any nightmare. "I don't want it."

The boy sneered. "There, now you've gone and hurt my feelings." He stood up. "Relax, dreamer. You'll get used to it."

Those behind her yanked her to her feet as the boy in the lead stood too.

He tossed the sketchbook at her feet.

Elle picked it up, brushed it off, and hugged it to her chest, with an aching feeling of longing for Charlie and blueberry muffins and even the smacking of Mrs. Flotsam's ruler.

"Oh," said the boy suddenly, "and I imagine you'll need this, too."

He handed her her dark blue pencil.

Elle felt behind her ear. Of course, the pencil was gone. How had he gotten it? She would've remembered if the dreadful lad had even come close to touching her.

"Who are you?" Elle demanded.

"Where are my manners?" He gave her a smile that defined the word cocky. "Call me Pan. Peter Pan."


	3. Chapter 2: How To Be An Optimist

Nights on Neverland were cold. They were dark. Darker than the broom closet in the orphanage where she and Charlie used to hide from imaginary ghosts as children. During the day the island was humid and the air was sickly sweet, and there was a kind of glitter in the air as if every atom of the place were magical.

Elle hated it all. Daytime, nighttime, she hated Neverland. And she did everything she could to escape it.

It had been a week on this ghastly island, and already she felt memories of London slipping away. It seemed the longer she stayed, the less she remembered, and she hated that too.

She didn't like hating things. She loathed hatred. It wasn't a nice feeling, having your insides boil in disgust. She wanted to love Neverland. She wanted to like her new life. She loved being happy, optimistic. Feeling good.

But she couldn't muster any lovely thoughts here, and she tried so hard. Unfair. Then again, as she'd theorized many times, maybe she deserved it. Villainous parents, remember, maybe that was it. If she deserved it, fine, yes, all right, but what kind of a miserable person would she be if she didn't fight the situation she'd been dumped into?

So she ran.

At night, almost every night, she ran.

The camp would be quiet, all except for two sentries posted around it. The Lost Boys would all be curled up somewhere on the ground, and Elle would creep past them. She always managed to get past the sentries, because they were never the same two boys, and they weren't expecting the nervous girl to make a break for it.

Her bravery surprised her, but she herself wouldn't call it bravery. Actually, she herself called it stupid. Very, very stupid. But she had to try, right? She couldn't give in!

So tonight she was huddled against a tree, dress soiled as it had been from a week of escape attempts and sleeping in the dirt. She didn't know how far she'd gotten yet. The island was still quite new to her.

Here came the crying. Sometimes she joined those unseen wailers. Sometimes she cried too, but she never let any of those wretched boys see it. She always turned around to cry. They didn't seem to care one way or the other.

Was that a snake?

No, just a bird. Good.

"Right, time to keep moving."

She took a deep breath and crept through a stream. Her dress dragged in the water. Well, it felt wonderful on her sore feet.

Elle heard shouts from the camp. Footsteps.

She started running again. She wasn't exactly nimble, especially in her old gown, so of course she had to trip over a log.

She stumbled and hit the mud, face smeared. That didn't feel so wonderful.

"Again?" came a cracking voice above her.

Elle hurried to her feet and tried to turn and bolt the other way. Mud squished between her toes.

A hand caught her arm.

"Over here!"

It was Devin. He was a shorter Lost Boy, dressed the same as any of them in his hooded cloak and dark trousers and boots. He was a brunette with freckles, and had probably come to Neverland at fourteen. He was prideful and never knew when to hold his tongue, unless it was around Pan, who seemed to put a kind of quiet in all of them.

"Get off!" Elle snapped. "Let me go!"

"You really are stupid, aren't you?" Devin huffed. "When are you gonna figure out you've got nowhere to go?"

Elle felt tears prick behind her eyes, but she wouldn't let them surface. "I don't care."

"I got her!" Devin called again into the air. He turned back to her. "Pan knows every corner of Neverland. You think he won't know where you are?"

"If I've got nowhere to go and he knows where I've gone," Elle began, drawing herself up to her full height, which wasn't much, "then why doesn't he just let me roam?"

"Because it gets annoying to get you back in time for dinner," Devin sneered.

The other Lost Boys arrived. Felix's club was slung over his shoulder, and the African-American Nibs was grinning at her as if she were the most ridiculous thing he'd ever seen.

"Come on," Felix droned. "Pan's waiting."

Elle's feet hurt, her cheeks burned, and she was covered in mud. Her hair was a mess and her dress would never be the same.

Did she care?

No!

A little bit, yes.

It was humiliating, being dragged back to Pan's hideout every night for a week. Especially when the ones dragging you tended to snicker at your expense.

The Lost Boys were dangerous and found pleasure in causing pain to living things. Well, besides each other. They seemed to have a code between them. Elle suspected they'd learned to behave this way from their sick-minded chieftain. Pan took being a bad example to an entirely different level.

Speak of the devil-literally...

Peter was standing in the center of the clearing, in front the bonfire.

"Release her," he ordered to the boys.

The hard grip around her arms immediately left her. They stepped back.

"D'you know, dreamer, I'm starting to think you don't like it here," Peter feigned deep thoughtfulness as he spoke.

Elle looked down and didn't respond.

"I'm getting tired of waking my boys to chase after you. Why do you run? You must know it's hopeless."

Elle felt a tear trace down her cheek. Hopeless. The way he said it made her feel it at last. What if she never left?

"Curly!" Peter directed his attention at a wild-haired Lost Boy. "Cut a few vines from the wood, will you? Ivy vines."

Elle glanced up. She knew she'd get a punishment. She always got a punishment for running. And it was always unspeakably cruel. She wanted very much to go through it all with her head held high, but she just wasn't the heroine sort. She was frightened; she was human.

Once, about three days ago, he'd forced her to eat the tip of a wild boar's tongue for getting particularly far into the jungle. She'd vomited behind an oak later until it landed on the ground before her, eyes watering-not from despair, but from the incredible nausea that turned her face as white as a sheet from the experience. The taste lingered, and had interrupted her dreams. This was something that annoyed Pan. He couldn't have her special, prophetic dreams toyed with, so at least she knew she probably wouldn't be eating anymore raw tongue tips again. That relief kept her from trembling now.

Vines, though. We're they going to half-choke her? She wouldn't put it past them. Pan wouldn't kill his dreamer, obviously, but he'd had fun watching her come close so far.

Only a week and she'd been through such horror! What would the rest of eternity look like, never aging?

"The rest of you," Pan growled, "take her to the Lagoon."

Felix led the way. Devin and Nibs had her arms again, and Devin seemed to find entertainment it prodding her back very gently (but irritatingly) with his homemade spear tip to speed her up.

"I'm not a horse," she hissed over her shoulder to him. "I don't need to be spurred!"

"You smell just as bad," he said, and made a face at her. "How could I know?"

Little rogue. The one Lost Boy she didn't fear. He was far too immature, too arrogant.

She hadn't ever been to the Lagoon. They'd never mentioned it; it was brand new to her. When they arrived after a twenty-minute trek through the forest, Elle saw it was actually a lovely spot.

The water was blue as forget-me-nots and clear as glass. There were a few large, tall rocks jutting from the seabed, but other than that it looked like a nice place for a swim.

Then she tried looking at it through their eyes. What torment could be had here?

She didn't have to guess, because Pan wasted no time. While the other boys looked uncomfortable without the treetops to hide them, Peter sauntered into the water, waist-deep, completely at home.

All he had to do was jerk his head over his shoulder, and Elle was pushed into the water after him.

Felix followed, Curly's vines in his hands.

The water was shockingly cold, and she inhaled sharply upon its touch.

Elle halted halfway in, standing on tiptoes.

Peter turned. "Well? Come on."

Elle's voice was small. "I can't swim."

He let out a short laugh through his nose. "Good."

A raft made of logs was brought to them. The Lost Boys on the shore pushed it out, and Elle was forced to climb on. She crouched in the moonlight, shivering and awkwardly trying not to fall in as they went deeper.

They stopped the raft beside one of the rocks. Felix tied Elle's wrists together with the vine and used the slack to create a loop.

He put the loop over the rock and tightened it. Everything he did was silent. He seemed to be nothing more than Pan's hands at times, hardly speaking and ever loyal.

Pan pushed the raft out from under her with one strong arm.

She was in the water, too deep to touch the bottom.

Elle floundered about, kicking, dress dragging her down, but the vine tying her to the rock by her hands kept her head just above the water.

Pan stood on the raft, Felix climbing up beside him silently.

"This should teach you to stay put," said Peter, narrowing his eyes. "It's not as if you have much choice here, though."

He seemed to think this funny; he smirked, revealing pearly white teeth. Felix used his club to begin rowing the two of them back toward shore.

"We'll be back to check up on you at dawn," Pan said, lifting a hand in farewell. "Perhaps by then you'll have learned your lesson."

Elle watched them float away. Her heartbeat quickened. Sharks, was that the plan? But she wouldn't be much use to him dead. Maimed, an arm taken off? No, she couldn't draw her dreams for him that way.

This was bad.

Well, obviously.

She couldn't swim. It was incredibly cold in that water. Her wrists itched like crazy, and all she could do to try to satisfy them was thrash around in the salty waves. Poison ivy to make her even more uncomfortable. He was sickening.

She hoped he didn't treat his loyal posse this way. They'd be crushed if he ever did anything like this to them.

Absently she wondered why they had such admiration for him. She didn't know Pan, or anything about him-how he'd come to live on Neverland, what made him so powerful, and what maniac named him orchestrator of the entire island? Who were the Lost Boys? Why were they called that? Why were they here?

All right! Enough thinking. Escape. Escaping, yes, excellent. Grand plan.

But, again, she couldn't swim.

Setback, that. No good. Even if she could get herself unbound, she'd sink like a rock with that wretched dress. But she was not taking it off. She wasn't that desperate. It was freezing; she'd need it later.

She didn't want to just take the punishment lying down. She wanted to put up a fight, because if she didn't...well, she quite honestly didn't need any more self-pity to roll in.

But what could she do? She couldn't unbind herself, and if she could, she'd drown.

Elle couldn't really think of a worse way to die than sinking slowly, body numb with cold, everything quiet, staring up at a moon she'd never see again...

No, no, no, it was too horrible. She'd take Pan's punishment over that. Hanging from a rock in saltwater. She could do that.

Then something raked across her leg.

She gasped and gritted her teeth. No blood rose to the surface, but it stung terribly.

It happened again, on the back of her other leg.

Again on her foot.

On her calf.

Across her ankle.

"Stop it!" she screamed, but she couldn't see anything. The waves were now black past midnight.

Something splashed water into her eyes. She jerked backward and bumped her head against the rock.

"Ow! Stop!" she snapped, frightened and in pain. "Don't-"

A hissing sound reached her ears, and bubbles drifted up. A slimy, glittering material slapped her in the face, hard.

Scales. They were sharp. She felt her cheek grow warm, smelled copper. She was bleeding now, all right.

Well, anything smelled better than saltwater. She didn't care if she never caught the scent of the sea again by this time.

She stifled a yelp as unseen hands gripped both her ankles and yanked hard.

Elle thought for one awful moment that she would be dragged beneath the water, but the ivy was tied tightly. It jerked her torso back up, just as her chin reached the waves.

Another splash in her eyes. Claws scratching her legs. A tug. A hiss. Splashing. Scratching. Pulling. Growling. Water. Stinging. Dragging. Snarling.

She stopped kicking at them. Stopped struggling to move around the rock and away from whatever invisible force was tormenting her in the dark. She just hung and let them toy with her. She didn't want to give up, but the scratches stung so badly, and with saltwater seeping around the cuts...

She couldn't rub her eyes when they were splashed. Kicking got her more claws. Best to be still. It hurt, but she had to be still, or it would hurt worse. Her thoughts slowed as the hours dragged. Her mouth became dry, and the blood on her cheek dried. Her eyelids drooped, but the claws kept her awake.

___Be still. Don't move. _

* * *

What was that? A cottage. Very old-fashioned. Open the door-what was inside? A dream catcher over the entrance. A bed in the corner. A back room. A table against the wall. Candles in the windowsill.

Why was this so familiar?

Something cold sloshed into Elle's face.

The dream trickled away and her eyes flew open.

She was still hanging from that rock. The sun beat down on her face. Her wrists were red. Her hair was soaked, save the very top. Her cheek was smeared with blood.

So she had fallen asleep. She must've been too exhausted to keep awake, even with the monsters swimming around her.

The raft floated in front of her. Pan stood there, just as he had the night before. Felix, his club poised over the water to row, looked down at her, expressionless.

Pan's hand was dripping. He casually wiped it on his tunic. He must've been the one to splash her awake.

"Did you have a pleasant sleep, dreamer?" he asked. "Hope the mermaids weren't too enthusiastic."

Mermaids.

So that was it.

A brunette head immediately appeared in the water a few feet away. She was lovely. Pearls hung in her hair and her skin was flawless, the color of wet sand.

She smiled up at Pan without affection. She looked at him like a snake looking at another, bigger snake. Well, a bit more intrigued than that.

"Well done," Peter told her. "I think she's had enough fun for one night."

The mermaid drifted closer to the raft, silent, staring at him with unblinking brown eyes.

"Go." Pan's voice was low and impatient.

The mermaid bared her teeth at him like a cat, then dove underwater, blue tail flashing in the sunlight.

Pan snapped his fingers. Felix leaned down and untied Elle's wrists.

Elle instantly started sinking. She wanted to grab the raft's side, but her arms were asleep!

Felix looked irritated as he grabbed her under the shoulders and pulled her onto the wooden craft.

"Back to shore, Felix," Pan ordered. "The dreamer has some drawing to do."

* * *

When they returned to camp, Elle's dress was only half dry. Some if the Lost Boys were out hunting, but others had stayed around the fire and were eating what looked to be a cooked bird of some kind. Elle's stomach rumbled, but nobody seemed to hear it.

She was escorted to her usual spot. It was a log positioned further away from the ones seated around the fire. It was under the large tree, surrounded by those nasty-looking thorn bushes. Her sketchbook sat open on it. She wondered which of them had been looking through it.

She sat down, and caught Devin sneering at her from the edge of the clearing. She made a face at him, rolling her eyes. Devin seemed surprised and looked the other way, pretending he hadn't seen it.

Peter stood in front of her, eyes smoldering. "Now you know," he said, "that trying to leave the camp without my permission has dire consequences."

Elle nodded, staring past him at the fire, shivering.

Pan didn't appear to care she was cold or wet. He picked up her sketchbook and dropped it in her lap. Her pencil disappeared from the dirt and reappeared in her hand with a wave of his.

"You dreamt last night," he said. "You always do. Draw it. Remember: anything to do with Henry is vital." He lifted his chin. "When you've finished, get some rest. You'll need it."

"I don't rest," she mumbled, almost afraid to speak. "I just sleep."

Pan didn't respond. He didn't sympathize. He turned on his heel. "Felix! Bring the bloodberries. The dreamer can't think on an empty stomach."

Bloodberries. That sounded healthy.

Elle's fingers shook as she drew the cottage she'd seen. She knew she was supposed to be dreaming of Henry, but she couldn't help it if that rarely happened. She couldn't control what she saw. She could only sketch it out.

Perhaps Peter was looking for one important piece of information. Perhaps, on the day that she dreamed it, she could go home. He wouldn't need her any longer.

She could go back and tell Wendy everything that had happened. Wendy seemed to love a good story. Then she could apologize to Charlie-make up something that sounded believable. And they could get adopted together, and she could forget Neverland and everything she'd been through, even in a single week.

Felix dropped half a coconut shell at her feet, filled with little red berries that smelled sweeter than candy.

"Thank you," Elle said quietly.

She knew manners weren't appreciated here, but she hadn't forgotten a certain detail from the previous night.

"A-And thank you for tying me so tightly," she added quickly. "The mermaids would've drowned me if you hadn't made sure..."

She trailed off. He was staring at her, still emotionless. His face was blank. But his eyes twinkled bewilderment as he watched her.

Slowly Felix straightened himself. He hefted his club over his shoulder and regarded her as if she were a plank of wood.

"Anyway," she finished awkwardly, "thank you."

No response. Felix turned around and went to join the other Lost Boys at the bonfire, sitting with his back to her.

Elle got the prickly feeling she was still being watched. Devin had left, possibly to hurt some innocent wildlife for sport; it couldn't be him. All the others were behaving as if she weren't there.

She jolted when she finally saw Pan studying her from the other side of the clearing.

He didn't look away. He didn't turn around. He went on looking at her, and she saw a smirk play with the edges of his mouth.

She couldn't tell if he was impressed, annoyed, or amused by her conversation with his most loyal Lost Boy. She herself was beginning to feel pathetic for doing it in the first place, but it had seemed only right.

She didn't like the menace in his eyes. Elle couldn't stand to look at Pan for more than a minute, if she was being honest with you. Quickly she averted her gaze and quietly began eating her berries.

She discovered the hard way why they had such a name. They weren't called bloodberries because they were red. It was because, if you even so much as squeezed them, the thickest, most scarlet of juices leaked out. In moments her fingers and mouth were stained, and she looked as if she'd just eaten a man alive.

Elle was delighted with this. She knew Charlie would've liked it too. He'd've stormed around the orphanage pretending he was Dracula, acting half his age. She might have joined him. She would've made-believe to be his victim, and lie on the rug outside the lads' rooms, covered in the juice, making them screech like little girls.

She suddenly got a burning desire to do it. She wanted to fall over right there in the dirt and pretend she'd been mauled. The idea gave her energy and she came very close to smiling.

Then she deflated. These Lost Boys were absolutely nothing like Charlie. None of them would find that funny. Likely they'd poke fun at her, or more likely, they'd get angry with her, and she definitely didn't want that. They weren't the tame, flirtatious boys at the orphanage. They were ruthless jungle creatures, every bit apart of the island as their savage leader.

Elle continued her drawing, pushing the berries to one side and trying not to get red fingerprints on the page.

Suddenly she wasn't very hungry anymore.

* * *

_**One Month Later...**_

Sometimes her dreams were clear as day. Other times, not a bit of it made sense.

This was not one of those dreams.

Elle stood on a pirate ship. Hadn't she dreamt of this vessel before? Yes, she must have. It was the very same ship the glowing yellow ball had boarded. That other dream seemed so far away now!

In this version of the ship, people actually stood on deck. That was interesting.

There was a woman with blonde hair, in foreign clothes. Actually, the majority of these people wore strange garments.

There was another woman, brunette, with a scowl on her face. She flexed her fingers and shared a conversation with the man at the wheel. Elle heard none of it; this dream was silent at the moment.

The man at the wheel wore all black leather. His right hand was not there; instead he bore an iron claw-a hook.

The couple standing beside the blonde woman looked distraught. The lady had very short hair the color of night. She was beautiful. The man with his arm about her waist was handsome in a gentle sort of way, with fair hair and a sword at his hip.

"It wasn't your fault, Emma."

Sound came rushing into Elizabeth's dream. Waves crashed. Wood creaked.

The man with the sword was speaking now.

"_We will save Henry._"

The boat suddenly shook, and Elle was thrown overboard.

The moment her body hit the ocean, she woke up.

Elle jolted into a sitting position. She was breathing hard. Henry. Finally. A dream involving Henry.

She pushed herself to her feet and took out her sketchbook. She flipped through it, looking for a blank page. Pan required that she draw everything, every time she slept. She slept often, as he forced her into naps when she wasn't tired at all, knowing if she slept she would dream.

He did this whenever he got impatient after speculation regarding the Truest Believer. He would sit and stare at the fire for hours, totally focused on the subject. He was planning the boy's arrival, she knew, but according to her dreams, Henry wasn't even born yet. He came from an entirely different century.

Pan was a great many things (and none of them very pleasant), and this included patient. But he had his limits. He'd work himself into a good pace, calculating Henry's appearance, how he could be used, where. Then, when he met a thought that he couldn't fit into the strategy, he'd pay Elle's little nook a visit and order her to have a nice long dream, in hopes of gaining more info. He didn't like waiting as long as he usually had to for a Henry dream.

Elle's nook was a patch of moss between two monstrous tree roots on the edge of the clearing, far from where the Lost Boys slept.

Back to Pan.

He wouldn't listen when she tried to tell him she couldn't control it. He didn't listen to anything she said. But that was hardly fair, she told herself generously, when she barely got the courage to speak to him at all. With Pan she'd adopted the rule of 'Don't Speak Unless Spoken To'. She couldn't help it. Her fear of him had grown each day.

A month of dreaming and drawing, and every single bit of space in that sketchbook was filled!

She flipped back to other sketches, frustrated. Pan had somehow silently trained her, probably on purpose, to draw what she saw in her slumber the moment she awoke, but she couldn't do that if she couldn't find an inch of blank paper to draw it on.

"Oh, there's got to be room here somewhere..." she muttered to herself.

"Have a nice nap, dreamer?"

Elle jolted, startled.

Curly leaned on his spear. "You always jump." He was grinning down at her with a nasty kind of teasing in his face.

"Perhaps if you didn't sneak about all the time..." Elle began, standing up and facing him before he could...she didn't know what. Do something boyish and cruel.

Curly gave her an amused look. "Who's sneaking? You just haven't learned your Three S's."

Elle bit her lip. "M-My Three S's?"

Curly stopped leaning on his spear. He raised his eyebrows, Pan-style. "Sound, Smell, Sight. Smart people already know how to use them properly. You've got to learn them if you want to survive longer than a month around here."

He turned to stroll away, obviously bored with the conversation now. They liked coming to spook her that way, then treating her like a fly a minute later.

Elle looked at her feet, hugging her sketchbook to her chest. "I've been here a month already," she muttered under her breath. "I guess I'm doomed."

Curly suddenly huffed out a laugh, surprising her. She hadn't known he'd heard.

"Well, it won't be me teaching you yet!" he said, glancing over his shoulder with mischievous hazel eyes. "You've got to ask Pan. Only Lost Boys learn things like that. Dunno what he's got planned already with you."

Elle glanced away. So she really was doomed-she couldn't form a proper sentence around Pan without her voice trembling. Why would she ask for lessons from him? It probably wasn't something she wanted to know anyway. Anything taught by him was sure to be demonic.

She had bigger things to worry about anyway. She needed to get her dream of the pirate ship on paper, but she didn't have any paper.

Well. She could at least inform him she was out of materials. That was important enough.

Maybe this was it. Maybe this was the missing piece of his little brain puzzle. Maybe this dream would be the last he needed. Maybe then, after five brutal weeks, she could go back to London.

But where would she look?

Pan wasn't in the clearing as usual. He wasn't sending test-outs to the Echo Caves-wherever that was. Whatever test-outs meant.

He wasn't off on some solo mission; she could tell by the faces of the boys. They always had thick looks of disappointment if he went anywhere without at least one of them.

Then where was he?

She stopped in the middle of the clearing. Then she turned to the right and ducked into the bushes. He must be nearby. The coward (or so she thought of him) rarely left the clearing to get his hands dirty. He was always sending his Lost Ones out for him to do some terrible deed or other-bottle the anguished tear of a redskin, scour the fairies' hangouts for their most precious dust, kill as much wildlife as possible on their way through the forest.

"Look who's up and about!"

Elle stiffened.

Pan dropped from a tree right in front of her. His pipes were in his hands, but she hadn't heard him play.

"Not running off again, are we?" he checked, raising an eyebrow.

Elle shook her head, mute with nervousness. Finally she squeaked out, "I just...I-I had a new dream."

Pan's eyes became sharper with interest; if it were possible he could look any more alert, he did.

"Let's see it then." He stepped forward and took the sketchbook from her hands as if she had stolen it from him and he was indignantly taking it back.

"It's full." Elle began chewing a strand of her long blonde hair, something she did unconsciously when she was anxious.

"Oh, I can see that." Pan looked completely relaxed. There wasn't a hint of irritation on his face. She wondered if playing his pipes helped to improve his attitude. "I think you'll find both covers are blank. Use those."

He tossed the book at her carelessly, and she caught it.

"It, er, it had to do with Henry," she stammered. "The dream. I thought you'd want to..."

Pan turned and she trailed off. "Go on."

She told him of her dream, and he stood still, listening with a calculating expression.

"So he'll have rescuers," Pan said when she'd finished. "That much was obvious." He chortled a bit. "Seems I know a few of them."

Elle was surprised, but she said nothing. She fidgeted, dress swishing.

"That should change a few things. The game is getting interesting."

He turned a distracted stare on her.

"You're dismissed. Go and draw what you like. Nibs will give you my orders as to when you'll be having your next rest."

Her heart dropped. "But..."

Pan waited, eyelids lowered as if she bored him.

"But I..."

All right, enough of this foolishness. She wasn't comfortable around him, but she was tired of sounding so meek.

She wasn't meek.

She was...orally challenged.

Yeah.

Elle lifted her head. Looking him in the eyes would be a bit much, wouldn't it? Well, no one cared. She would brave that too. Might as well go all the way and get it over with.

"I thought you had as much information as you needed," she managed. "I've done everything you asked."

"And?"

Elle counted to three and took the plunge. "I want to go home."

He looked irritated now. But also as if he'd been expecting it. She thought she saw a little bit of surprise on his face that she'd even tried a demand like that, after five weeks avoiding his immediate vicinity. But it was gone before she could be sure.

"You don't seem to understand." He walked slowly up to her. "You're not done here until _I_ say you are."

Elle's heart sank even further, if that were possible. Her eyes stung. She fingered her charm bracelet. She did that when she was upset; it was almost like an instinct, but she knew not where it came from.

She still wasn't free! Why had she even dared to hope? What was the point? Despair clawed at her.

She saw the fierce pride in his gaze. It was as if he were looking through her, aware of how he'd crushed her so easily, and he enjoyed it.

This made her angry. No one person should be able to hurt other people this way and get by.

But calling him out on it would be an incredibly unwise thing to do, she decided nervously. It would infuriate him. He was dangerous when not in a pleasant mood.

She hated him. He disgusted her, and she wanted to show it in that moment.

Unlike Pan, Elizabeth got angry in spurts.

She disliked showing anything but good cheer, which irked others around her. If she was ever hurt or insulted or treated poorly (or just generally annoyed), she would bottle it up and trained herself not to unleash it. There was so much stored up inside her, a large pile she ignored for the majority of her life. Whenever she got truly upset, she let it fly about her mind for a few seconds, and it took her almost no time to cool down again. She always felt foolish after letting it loose anyway.

This was what happened now, but she didn't open her mouth to release it through words.

She had to do something to defy him without...well, actually defying him. He wanted her to look broken and devastated. So...What was the opposite of defiance?

Surrender?

Oh. Oh, this was ridiculous. She was so dreadfully dumb.

She took another deep breath.

Horrible idea.

She closed her eyes.

Stupid, Elle. Frightfully stupid.

Then she opened them again, and suddenly her mouth bloomed into a pretty little smile. Where had that come from? You idiot!

And out of nowhere the right words came dancing from her lips. Imagine that!

"Oh," she said quickly, "that's all right. I thought you might want a few more pictures first. Information is power, after all."

Stupid.

Peter's eyebrows shot up to his hairline. He regarded her with bright eyes full of interest at this foreign reaction. He seemed intrigued, not angry.

Then he did something that frightened her a bit, as it was the last thing she'd predicted he'd do.

He laughed.

It was brief, but genuinely he seemed amused with her.

Then he stopped and leaned back as if something invisible supported him, arms crossed over his chest. The pipes had disappeared.

"So nice to see we have an understanding," he said, tone light.

His green eyes were twinkling. Like twin mermaid scales caught in the afternoon sunshine.

Elle nodded, fingertips numb, heart pounding hard. What had happened just now? She'd been silly, yes, but what about him? That was...unsettling, the way he'd responded! So cheerily, almost delighted. Just as if she'd struck up a new game.

She'd thought he'd strike her or something. He might've taken her words for sarcasm, and that would've enraged him for certain, wouldn't it? But he didn't do any of those things.

Perhaps she hadn't gleaned so much about him as she'd thought?

...His laugh was odd. Cold and breathy, like winter, but so childishly innocent-sounding that the cold might've thawed, had he not insisted on stopping so abruptly. He didn't let his mirth linger in the air, as if he were above feelings of hilarity and joy.

She straightened and closed her dog-eared sketchbook. She had to clear her throat before replying.

"Yeah, certainly," she mumbled. "I'll just...go wait for Nibs' orders, then."

She tried to sound cooperative and indifferent, but his constant unpredictability made her dizzy. This was no ordinary boy.

Pan watched her turn and walk through the foliage, eyebrows still raised.

Elle ran her thumb across the back cover of her sketchpad.

If one were to draw a laugh, what would it look like?

* * *

**(Author's Note: Boy, these chapters are taking a while, huh? Working on the next one right away! Detailed reviews are appreciated! ~Doverstar)**


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